re: The official Interstellar thread (spoilers)

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but as substantive as cotton candy. Won't think much about it. Certainly nothing deep.

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my man.

Nolan to a T

Carson, how can you like Sunshine so much, but not like Interstellar?

Saw this tonight, and I'm still not sure what happened.

I plan on catching up with most of this thread tomorrow and see what y'all think. I still need to think about it a little more, but at this point, this is where I stand: I really enjoyed the movie, but am not sure if I think the premise/end was stupid or too outlandish or if I think it was fantastic and sort of outside the box. I think ultimately I'll fall somewhere in the middle.

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I really think Nolan reached a little too far on this one. He tried to tie up too many loose ends in the final chapter, and it seemed a little too feel good for me. I can't believe the studio didn't step in and curtail some of it. It was reminded me of how Lucas was out of control on some of his movies. Somebody should've stepped in when he scripted Cooper to sacrifice himself into the black hole, yet he somehow survives and is found floating in space around Saturn. Oh, and his ship doesn't survive, but he somehow does and while in the Black hole, he communicates with his daughter 25 years previous. That scene was just way too much for me to accept, even it being a Sci Fi movie.

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Agreed.

Now that I've had the night to think about it, I think the end (final 30 minutes or so I guess) just fell a little flat for me. At least in terms of believability. The whole paradox thing was quite a jump for me, in that we (humankind from the distant future) are the ones who put the wormhole out there to save us, yet without the wormhole we couldn't be saved in the first place. That makes no sense to me.

Okay, so Cooper was ultimately the one who "saved humans" because he went into the black hole and into the fifth dimension and was able to communicate with Murph, right? So that means that the information he gave to her via the watch and Morse Code allowed her to solve Brand's equation...I know that they said that he had solved the equation long ago and it was useless but that's because half of it was unknown (because he didn't have data from "inside the black hole"), so the information that Cooper sent to Murph was essentially the missing half that lets the equation actually be solvable and allowed the space station(s) to be launched (and humans on Earth to be saved rather than just starting anew with embryos on new planets, a.k.a. Plan B). But that, again, goes back to the whole paradox thing where Cooper (a.k.a. a human) saves everything (via Murph) thanks to the wormhole that "they" (future humans) sent.

The whole idea that love can transcend space and time seemed a little ridiculous, but I went with it. And even though the whole paradox thing bugged the shite out of me, I still really enjoyed the film, and did like how even though it was stretching the limitations of my believability, I still liked how it connected to everything (like the "ghost" in Murph's room ended up being Cooper from the future). That was kinda cool, and touching.

All in all, the acting was decent. I thought MM did a great job, but Michael Caine sort of mailed it in. The girl playing young Murph was great, as was Chastain playing older Murph. The astronauts were all casted pretty well too, and each did a good enough job.

The movie was gorgeous, and seeing it in IMAX was fantastic, but I don't think it's necessary though. I will say that it was easily the loudest movie I've ever experienced though...annoyingly loud at times to where I couldn't hear/understand what the characters were saying because there was so much noise (and in the IMAX, it was literally deafening).

I really liked the robots, CASE and TARS. Thought that was interesting and cool, and they were legit funny and great characters.

All in all, this is nowhere near Nolan's best work, and as sort of convoluted as the third act was, it keeps it from being really great for me. But it was very entertaining and I'd easily recommend it to people. And while it doesn't need to be seen in IMAX, I'd say seeing it in theaters makes for a better experience than at home, no matter how awesome your home theater setup is.

I'm sure my points have been discussed ad nauseum in this thread, so sorry about that. And I'm now about to trudge through the thread and see what others think on it. And I assume OML jizzed all over the place throughout the thread.

Also, I was wondering if Cooper actually died after entering the black hole, and the rest of the movie was in his mind (sort of like the "last thing you see before you die is your kids" thing). But then the end where he takes the ship to go find/help Amelia sort of disproved that.

Don't know if it was mentioned before in the past 70+ pages but how could future humans create all that for them to save the human race? The 1st time around there were no future humans to create all that since they were going through it for the 1st time. So human race would have died out. If human race died out then they couldn't have evolved to the point to be able to create the cube.

Where did these future humans come from?

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Where did these future humans come from?

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Time does not work the same way for these future humans. If they have transcended space and time they don't need events of the past to cause events of the future.

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I really think Nolan reached a little too far on this one. He tried to tie up too many loose ends in the final chapter, and it seemed a little too feel good for me. I can't believe the studio didn't step in and curtail some of it. It was reminded me of how Lucas was out of control on some of his movies. Somebody should've stepped in when he scripted Cooper to sacrifice himself into the black hole, yet he somehow survives and is found floating in space around Saturn. Oh, and his ship doesn't survive, but he somehow does and while in the Black hole, he communicates with his daughter 25 years previous. That scene was just way too much for me to accept, even it being a Sci Fi movie.

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Then what you're proposing is taking away the overall message of the film. You take away that scene, then the entire message goes to crap and really doesn't have that much of a redeeming message for humanity as a whole.

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Nolan got away with spinning something similar in Inception, because he could pretty much make up his own rules when dealing with altered dream sequences, but in Interstellar, there is just too much established in that genre, that he is re-writing.

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Have you seen 2001? The finale scene in 2001 is the single most defining scene in all of sci fi and it redefined on what we think of it of a genre as a whole. This is no more preposterous than that ending. Seems to have significantly used that as inspiration. Doesn't matter what happened to Bowman's ship anymore than what happened to Cooper's. They're beings beyond our comprehension, so I think they could just make the ship disappear completely.

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The people giving Nolan a pass, wouldn't allow any other director to take the liberties that he did with this movie, but because it's Nolan, and he's known for plot twists, they give him far more latitude, than he deserves in this case. Just because it mirrors Inception, then people accept this film and overlook obvious inconsistencies. JMHO

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People are giving Nolan a pass because he attempted to one up 2001 in scope and scale and at least got close to it. It's hard not to admire the absolute ambition of this project.

Plus Nolan isn't all that reliant on twists. Really the only one of his films really does that, and it's the Prestige. He's known for telling stories non-linearly, to where he wants you to think. He doesn't do tricks and let's you know from the start that he's screwing around with time. The fact that the top is still spinning at the end and that fifth dimensional humans are responsible for this isn't a twist that redefines the story in a way say "The Sixth Sense" does. The core of both of those stories is a father seeking a way to save himself and his children. It's pretty straight forward when you think about, but just told non-linearly.

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Now that I've had the night to think about it, I think the end (final 30 minutes or so I guess) just fell a little flat for me. At least in terms of believability. The whole paradox thing was quite a jump for me, in that we (humankind from the distant future) are the ones who put the wormhole out there to save us, yet without the wormhole we couldn't be saved in the first place. That makes no sense to me.

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Because you're thinking of time as a straight line. An example of a forth dimensional being would be Dr. Manhattan, where he experiences all time simultaneously, but can still only be in one individual timeline and only perceive things through his body.

Fifth dimensional beings would not be constrained by time or location whatsoever. They are members of multiple plains of reality and existence. Therefore so long as humans on a single timeline made it to that point, then the fifth dimensional beings could come in from an alternate universe and save us from extinction. They would probably want us to evolve to the point that they are, and this would still be able to join with them likely thousands or millions of years later when they have the technology and knowledge to control the universe as we know it. Basically transcending into a fifth dimensional being would turn oneself into God.

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And I assume OML jizzed all over the place throughout the thread.

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Safe assumption.

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Because you're thinking of time as a straight line. An example of a forth dimensional being would be Dr. Manhattan, where he experiences all time simultaneously, but can still only be in one individual timeline and only perceive things through his body.

Fifth dimensional beings would not be constrained by time or location whatsoever. They are members of multiple plains of reality and existence. Therefore so long as humans on a single timeline made it to that point, then the fifth dimensional beings could come in from an alternate universe and save us from extinction. They would probably want us to evolve to the point that they are, and this would still be able to join with them likely thousands or millions of years later when they have the technology and knowledge to control the universe as we know it. Basically transcending into a fifth dimensional being would turn oneself into God.

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Nah, I understand what people are saying about 5th dimensional beings (though I'm not sure I buy that they exist...but half the fun of what makes this shite interesting is believing or choosing not to). But the paradox created is definitely a huge problem for me. I get that 5D beings can basically access/exist at any point in time since time doesn't run in a straight line for them, but the issue still remains that at the point of the present (for the movie), we aren't evolved into those beings yet...so if it truly is "us" who sent the wormhole, then that can't exist because without it, we go extinct. And if "we" aren't around in the future to send the wormhole (again, acknowledging that "future" to them isn't necessarily time in a straight line) then the circle falls in upon itself.

I'm around page 20 in the thread, and I've seen you (and others) explain it several times. While the theories "make sense" (as much as they can with our current understandings of how the universe works), they don't within the framework of the movie for me.

I know ULSaban caught a lot of shite early on in the thread, but I kinda agree with what he is saying about how the last 30 minutes or so of the movie bring down what was a fantastic movie up to that point.

ALso, your "this is the new 2001" overreaction on like page two was hilarious. There was literaly zero chance that you were gonna come out of this film thinking anything other than that this was one of the best and most imaginative movies you've ever seen. Zero chance.

I'm hoping that the explanations and discussion pick up as I tread through the thread as more and more people watch the movie.

i havent read much of this thread, but does any one ask/answer if the worm hole moves? They mention it is near saturn and remains near saturn when they go through it.

was it orbiting saturn?